ACRL News Issue (B) of College & Research Libraries June 1 9 9 0 /5 6 5 Conclusion The growth of OPACs highlights the need for standardized curriculum cataloging procedures. The cost effectiveness o f placing curriculum m ate­ rials in OPACs is closely associated with the availa­ bility and quality of records in the bibliographic utilities. The rising rate of m em ber-input records in OCLC indicates the increasing com m itm ent of curriculum centers to shared cataloging and rein­ forces the need for standardizing curriculum cata­ loging procedures. T he ease o f transferring records from biblio­ graphic utilities to OPACs provides further motiva­ tion for the establishm ent of such standardization. C ooperative sharing o f b ibliographic records through national utilities provides the opportunity to enhance access to curriculum materials collec­ tions. ■ ■ Special collections in the Southeast By James B. Lloyd Special Collections Librarian University o f Tennessee, Knoxville and William B. Eigelsbach Senior Library Assistant University o f Tennessee, Knoxville A special report on special collections. This survey of mid-sized academic libraries in the southeast came about in response to a specific administrative need—the perhaps uni­ versal desire for more staff. O ne way to prove our need was to prove that we had fewer people p e r­ forming the same functions than other repositories of comparable size. Since it did not seem appropri­ ate to ask colleagues to fill out another survey to meet such an im m ediate and personal need, we surveyed by phone. And we limited ourselves to mid-sized academic libraries in the southeast, since that is our environm ent, purposely om itting places like the University of Virginia because they are so much larger, and going no farther west than Arkan­ sas. As might be expected, we had some difficulty in interpreting our statistics, and sometimes were forced to call back for clarification. T here seem to have been several reasons for this. F o r one thing the faculty, paraprofessional, clerical staffing struc­ tu re which we use here does not exactly match classifications used elsewhere. F o r another, the fig­ ures themselves may be deceiving. Staff may be dedicated to non-visible functions, i.e., functions which we did not survey, such as microfilming or staffing an isolated public service point. T he size of a repository sometimes proved difficult to com ­ pare, since conversion formulas betw een items and feet differed so widely that we were forced to make some adjustm ents on our own. And sometimes even the volume count for rare books may be unreliable. In our case, we have a second collection o f some 100,000 volumes which, though not rare books is part o f Special Collections. If we had chosen to count these volumes, we would have appeared much larger than we really are. 5 6 6 / C&RL News TABLE 1 SPECIA L C O L L E C T IO N S SURVEY: STAFF Special Collection Enrollment Professionals Paraprofessionals Clerical Total Staff Auburn University 19,500 5.0 3.0 2.0 10.0 Clemson University 16,100 5.5 5.0 0.0 10.5 Duke University 9,700 8.0 10.5 4.5 23.0 East Carolina University 15,500 3.0 3.0 0.0 6.0 East Tennessee State Univ. 9,000 3.0 1.0 1.0 5.0 Florida State University 24,000 3.0 1.0 1.0 5.0 Louisiana State University 27,500 9.0 8.0 2.0 19.0 University o f Alabama 17,100 4.0 3.0 * 1.0 8.0 University of Arkansas 14,000 2.5 6.0 1.0 9.5 University of Florida 33,700 4.0 2.0 0.0 6.0 University o f Georgia 25,400 8.0 7.0 1.0 16.0 University of Kentucky 20,400 6.0 6.0 1.0 13.0 University of Louisville 23,300 8.0 2.0 1.0 11.0 Univ. of Southern Mississippi 11,000 7.0 3.0 0.0 10.0 University of Tennessee 21,200 1.0 3.0 0.0 4.0 University of W est Virginia 18,000 3.0 7.5 0.0 10.5 Tulane University 13,800 6.0 10.0 1.0 17.0 Vanderbilt University 9,100 3.0 4.0 3.0 10.0 (Average) 18,200 4.9 4.7 1.1 10.75 TABLE 2 SPECIAL C O L L E C T IO N S SURVEY: H O L D IN G S Special Collection Volumes Manuscripts Archives Auburn University 63,800 2,500 2,500 Clemson University 15,000 3,600 1,400 Duke University 100,000 13,000 6,000 East Carolina University 0 2,500 2,000 East Tennessee State Univ. 2,400 2,000 600 Florida State University 55,100 2,250 1,000 Louisiana State University 100,000 15,000 2,000 University of Alabama 25,000 6,700 10,000 University of Arkansas 28,500 7,500 500 University of Florida 40,000 6,750 2,400 University of Georgia 200,000 7,500 10,500 University o f Kentucky 124,000 9,400 9,100 University of Louisville 80,000 7,000 7,000 Univ. of Southern Mississippi 78,000 4,950 1,600 University of Tennessee 50,000 5,000 3,000 University o f W est Virginia 28,000 6,500 6,500 Tulane University 82,000 9,000 2,500 Vanderbilt University 42,000 2,200 3,000 (Average) 61,900 6,300 4,000 W e discovered a num ber of different adm inis­ trative configurations which, though not part of Table 1, may be of some interest. Perhaps the most unusual is the University o f Louisville, where, though there is one administrative unit, the physi­ cally separate archives/records center also collects regional manuscripts, and the book collection is m aintained in thirty-five separate entities, some of which contain manuscripts as well. In the most com mon arrangem ent, found in ten of eighteen institutions, special collections is responsible for university archives b u t not for records m anage­ ment. Only two schools have separately adm ini­ stered archives; three, including Louisville, have June 1990 / 567 separate archives/records m anagem ent facilities; and only two special collections departm ent are responsible for records m anagem ent in-house. Tables 1 and 2 require little explanation, but in the interest of completeness several conclusions might be drawn. The average special collections department in the southeast is supported by an en ­ rollment of 18,200 and has a staff of 10.7— 4.9 p ro ­ fessionals, 4.7 paraprofessionals, and 1.1 clerical staff—who perform three functions. They adm ini­ ster rare books, 61,900 volumes; manuscripts, 6,300 linear feet; and archives, 4,000 linear feet. The University of Georgia has the largest rare book collection and the most processed archives, LSU the largest manuscript collection and Duke the largest staff. And we should add a final caveat. It could be argued, and rightly so, that our choice of institu­ tions was arbitrary. We included Duke, but not the University of North Carolina or North Carolina State. In our single foray across the Mississippi we included the University of Arkansas, but not the University of Missouri or any of a num ber of com­ parable institutions in Texas. We included East Carolina but not W estern Carolina, the University of Southern Mississippi but not Mississippi State, etc. All true. And we have no defense to offer other than to point out that we were aiming for a rep re­ sentative sample, not comprehensiveness. ■ ■ News from the Field Acquisitions • Bowling Green State University’s Popular Culture Library, Ohio, has recently acquired an important new collection of books and manuscript materials in the field of science fiction, fantasy, and horror literature from Sheldon R. Jaffery of Cleve­ land, Ohio. A special strength of the collection is Jaffery’s near com plete series of Arkham House books, the oldest and most prestigious publisher of weird and supernatural fiction. F ounded in 1939 for the express purpose of perpetuating the w rit­ ings of H.P. Lovecraft, this specialized press b e ­ came the foremost showcase for the greatest writ­ ers in the genre of macabre fiction. Arkham House was where the works of Ray Bradbury, Robert Bloch, A.E. Van Vogt, Ramsey Campbell, and Fritz Leiber, for example, were first published in book form. These rarities are included in the Jaffery Collection at the Popular Culture Library. The collection also includes correspondence, m anu­ scripts, research files, and notes that Jaffery used in writing more than eight books, research guides, and anthologies. O f particular value is the corre­ spondence Jaffery conducted with many of the Arkham House authors while compiling his book Horrors and Unpleasantries: A Collectors Price Guide and Bibliography o f Arkham House (1982) and the revised edition, The Arkham House Com­ panion (1989). M anuscript materials for Jaffery’s The Corpse-Maker (1988), an anthology of pulp magazine short stories by Hugh B. Cave, and Fu­ ture and Fantastic Worlds: A Bibliographical (1972-1987) Retrospective o f D A W Books (1987) are also included in the collection. • Kent State University Libraries, Ohio, have recently received the papers of actor-director Robert Lewis, whose 60-year career has taken him from Broadway to Hollywood to London. The collection includes letters from w riters Sean O ’Casey, K atherine Anne P o rter and Trum an C apote, com posers Aaron C opeland, Stephen Sondheim and Virgil Thomson, and artists Don Bachardy, Cecil Beaton and Alfred Stieglitz in addition to hundreds of actors with whom he has worked. Lewis’s papers also include annotated scripts o f all the plays in which he appeared as well as those he directed. Kent’s D epartm ent of Special Collections houses other significant theater re ­ search collections as well as the Collection of Motion Picture and Television Performing Arts which features clipping files on hundreds of actors. • Saginaw Valley State University’s Melvin J. Zahnow Library, University Center, Michigan, has acquired two major gifts. The Nancy Stube Collec­ tion consists of over 3,500 volumes in the areas of late 19th Century American history and the phi­ losophy of political science collected over several decades. It was donated to the Library by Mrs. Stube in memory of her parents. The second acqui­ sition is the personal library of Harold Anderson, form er Professor of Psychology at Michigan State University and one of the founders of the study of child psychology. This collection represents 40